"She asked me a thousand questions, about myself and father and you, about our life in Rome, your occupations, our home life and our tastes. I really believe that she made me tell our whole history day by day, ever since I was born; I talked so much that I was tired out that evening."
"It seems that this lady is terribly inquisitive; for what does it all matter to her?"
"Now you mention it, I believe that she is a little inquisitive; but it is a pleasure to answer her questions; she listens to you with so much interest, and she is so pleasant! Come, don't speak ill of her, or I shall be angry with you!"
"Very well, let us say no more about her; God forbid that I should teach you distrust and dread, my lovely angel heart! Go to bed, now; father is waiting for me. To-morrow we will talk again of your adventure, for surely this great friendship with a beautiful princess is a marvellous adventure in a life like yours—although she no more thinks of you now than of the last pair of slippers she wore. No matter! don't put on that injured air. It may be that, some day when she is lonely and idle, the Princess of Palmarosa will send for you, to be entertained again by your prattle."
"You don't know what you are saying, Michel. The princess is not idle, and if you insist upon taking it this way, I will tell you that, kind-hearted as she is, she has the reputation of being decidedly cold with people of our station. Some say that she is proud, others that she is timid. The fact is that she always speaks pleasantly and courteously to the workmen and servants who come in contact with her, but that she speaks to them so little, so little!—that she is noted for it, and that some people who have worked for her for years have never known the sound of her voice and have hardly seen her in her own house. So that her friendship for father and me is no commonplace thing; it is genuine friendship, and your mockery will never prevent me from relying upon it. Good-night, Michel; I am not very well pleased with you to-night; I never saw you with this sarcastic air before. You talk as if you meant to say that I am only a little girl and no one can love me!"
"That is not my thought, so far as I myself am concerned, at all events! for, little slip of a girl as you are, I adore you!"
"What did you say, brother? You adore me? that is a lovely word. Kiss me."
The child threw herself into his arms. Michel embraced her lovingly, and as she laid her lovely brown head on his shoulder, he kissed the long hair that fell over the girl's half uncovered back.
But suddenly he pushed her away with a painful shudder. All the burning thoughts that had excited his brain an hour earlier recurred to his mind with the vividness of remorse, and it seemed to him that his lips were no longer pure enough to bless his little sister.
He was no sooner alone than he rushed through the door of the old house in which he lived, without pausing to close that of his room. To tell the truth, he paid no heed to the distance he travelled, and, still haunted by his dreams, he fancied that he stepped directly from the landing of his attic to the marble peristyle of the villa. And yet it was nearly a mile from the last houses of the suburb of Catania to the gateway of the palace.